Sinergia (ACE Top Charity) is Committing Fraud
Both Sinergia and ACE have acknowledged that the 354 piglets spared per dollar metric is wrong.[1] However, Sinergia continues to deceive donors by advertising this metric.[2] This is not a mistake — this is fraud.[3]
ACE is promoting a fraudulent charity.[4]
Effective altruists dedicate their lives to making the world a better place. We deserve better.
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ACE Post - See “Issue 3”
Sinergia Post 1 - See “Female Piglets Surgical Castration”
Sinergia Post 2 - See “Sinergia reviewed the spreadsheet ”
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Legal Definition of Fraud—Note: A former U.S. Attorney’s Office lawyer with over 20 years of legal experience reviewed this situation, and concluded that Sinergia’s conduct constitutes unambiguous fraud under U.S. law.
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“A fraudulent charity” does not sound to me much like “a charity that knowingly used a mildly overoptimistic figure for the benefits of one of its programs even after admitting under pressure it was wrong’. Rather, I think the rhetorical force of the phrase comes mostly from the fact that to any normal English speaker it conjures up the image of a charity that is a scam in the sense that it is taking money, not doing charitable work with it, and instead just putting it into the CEO’s (or whoever’s) personal bank account. My feeling on this isn’t really effected by whether the first thing meets the legal definition of fraud, probably it does. My guess is that many charities that almost no one would describe as “fraudulent organizations” have done something like this or equivalently bad at some point in their histories, probably including some pretty effective ones.
Not that I think that means Singeria have done nothing wrong. If they agree the figure is clearly overoptimistic they should change it. Not doing so is deceptive, and probably it is illegal. But I find it a bit irritating that you are using what seems to me to be somewhat deceptive rhetoric whilst attacking them for being deceptive.
There’s also a big difference between what’s technically illegal and what a court would realistically punish a person or an organization for doing, since the courts rely on discernment or, more fittingly, judgment. The latter is much more relevant for deciding whether you should use the word “fraud” in the title of a post about a charity.
Sometimes rationalist-y people and lawyers really like to use/insist on maximally precise/literal language or legalese. I have a word for lawyers who do this in my business interactions with them; shitty lawyers.
I’m somewhat sympathetic to these people since it allows for exact communication and for some, it makes truthful information sharing easier. However, this just isn’t how the world works. What you point to simply isn’t fraud by the commonplace usage of the word. What you mean is that by your interpretation, they should advertise 285 piglets/dollar and not 354 and that you don’t think their reason for stating 354 isn’t well supported.
Again, this over-the-top and inflammatory language is hurting rather than helping you and the animal welfare movement.
I would recommend deleting this post and re-posting with a new, less sensationalist title and with more context and detail in the body of the post. As written, this post makes me trust you less and I imagine others are having the same reaction.
If you have a point and then overstate your point, people will be distracted by the overstatement and not focus as much on the actual point. This is one reason why measured criticism is often more persuasive than heightened rhetoric.
Scott Alexander introduces the ‘noncentral fallacy’ as follows: “X is in a category whose archetypal member gives us a certain emotional reaction. Therefore, we should apply that emotional reaction to X, even though it is not a central category member.”
This post seems like an archetypal instance of the noncentral fallacy.
I don’t see where Sinergia acknowledged that? From the comment you linked, it sounds like they still believe it’s a fair estimate.
Hi Michael,
Thank you for your comment.
Here is the relevant quote from Sinergia Post 1 (note: we didn’t add the bracketed part in this quote, Sinergia did): [1]
To further clarify:
ACE gave Sinergia credit for helping female piglets through surgical castration commitments — even though female piglets can’t be surgically castrated.
This issue is what led ACE to reduce Sinergia’s impact calculation from 354 piglets per dollar to 285.
As stated in the ACE Post:[2]
Sinergia Post 1 - See “Female Piglets Surgical Castration”
ACE Post - See “Issue 3”
Did you let Sinergia know their website still shows the old, incorrect estimate of 354 instead of the new, updated estimate of 285? What reason do you have to believe that staff at Sinergia have an intent to deceive? Is it possible they forgot to update their website or haven’t gotten around to it yet?